Many different types of devices having storage, such as flash drives, digital cameras, digital media players, etc. communicate with a host system, such as a personal computer. A vendor or a manufacturer of such a device (referred to as a device provider herein) often provides a customized representation of the device for a user interface. A representation of the device for a user interface may be a graphical representation, a textual representation, a sound, etc. For example, a device provider may provide a custom icon, to be presented through the graphical user interface of the host system. A representation of the device, such as a custom icon, may change to indicate a change in a state of the device, or different representations may be used to indicate different states of the device. Frequently, one or more custom icons representing the device are included in a device-specific device driver, device-specific utility or other device-specific program supplied by the device provider. For the host system to use the custom icon(s), the host system must have the device-specific driver, utility or application installed.
Some devices having storage are commonly used with several different host systems, requiring that a device-specific driver, utility or application supplied by the device provider be installed on each host system with which the device is used. Due to the increasing popularity and increasing variety of devices having storage, including flash drives, digital cameras and media players, often multiple different devices having storage may be used with a single host system, necessitating that a device-specific driver, utility or application for each different device be installed on each host system. The installation of so many different device-specific drivers or utilities from different device providers on each host system is cumbersome and inefficient.
Some device providers avoid the use of “standard” device drivers, such as those provided through an operating system, in part, because standard device drivers do not allow a vendor or manufacturer of the device to customize the user experience through custom icons associated with the device.